


On Guard

by caffeine-vaccine (HashtagLEH)



Series: Tactics From the Isle (And How They Carry Over Into Auradon) [7]
Category: Descendants (Disney Movies), The Isle of the Lost Series - Melissa de la Cruz
Genre: Evie & Jay & Mal & Carlos de Vil as Found Family, Gen, Isle of the Lost (Disney) is a Terrible Place, Nice Audrey Rose (Disney), No Dialogue, POV Audrey Rose, Past Child Abuse, d1 rewrite
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-16
Updated: 2020-02-16
Packaged: 2021-02-27 21:20:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22762354
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HashtagLEH/pseuds/caffeine-vaccine
Summary: When the Four had first arrived in Auradon, they were on guard, which Audrey completely understood. At best, they were in unfamiliar territory, and at worst they were surrounded by enemies who wanted nothing more than to destroy them. So she did her best to be a friendly face, even going so far as to go out of her way and extend the hand of friendship.
Series: Tactics From the Isle (And How They Carry Over Into Auradon) [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1600366
Comments: 7
Kudos: 267





	On Guard

**Author's Note:**

> I had intended for this to be more of people in Auradon realizing how terrible the Isle really was, but it ended up just being Audrey's thoughts and observations. I don't even know what I'm doing anymore. XD

The thing about the Isle kids was that they didn’t understand diplomacy, not the same way that the people of Auradon instinctively did from being raised in the environment where insults were carefully laid alongside polite smiles and charming laughs.

Because of this, the four from the Isle had a certain way of making Auradonians feel awkward without even intending to. Not that they were apologetic of course, but it was a surprise when people shifted uncomfortably when one of the four would make a comment that would at best casually insult an important royal and at worst would imply that said royals were unfit for rule.

One of the things that made everyone uncomfortable was the casual way that they talked about the abuse that ninety-nine percent of Isle kids faced not just from other Villains on the Isle and their kids, but from their own parents and guardians. Having to face the fact that Auradon had tossed the Villains onto the Isle and then allowed them to procreate and then ignored all the innocent kids…it was a hard blow. Some internalized this information and vowed to be better, to make things better, but many also lashed out at the ones they saw as the enemies, because they were making them feel guilty and they couldn’t handle it.

Audrey wasn’t certain whether or not the Isle kids intended to call people out by talking about their abuse, because they were definitely capable of being that sneaky, but she also thought that maybe it was just because abuse was so normal on the Isle that they hadn’t thought it was taboo to talk about in Auradon. In any case, even after they had surely realized that it made some people uncomfortable, they didn’t stop or even hold back bringing it up casually when it came up.

One thing that Audrey _did_ notice, that she was pretty sure no one else (except maybe Ben) had, was that they never talked about it in a way that was asking for help, or even was particularly revelatory in a personal manner. It just…was, to them.

Something else that she noticed, that wasn’t immediately apparent, was how they viewed adults.

When the Four had first arrived in Auradon, they were on guard, which Audrey completely understood. At best, they were in unfamiliar territory, and at worst they were surrounded by enemies who wanted nothing more than to destroy them. So she did her best to be a friendly face, even going so far as to go out of her way and extend the hand of friendship.

And, she liked to think that they relaxed a bit as time went on. Maybe, she thought, they would be able to see her as at least an ally. After learning more about the horrors of the Isle – especially that they didn’t even have fresh fruit there? Insane – she was on Ben’s side when it came to bringing more kids to Auradon, to give them a chance for a better life. She had been wary in the beginning, but as time passed, she was unable to see the four as anything but the product of their circumstances – even Mal, the daughter of her family’s enemy, didn’t give off evil vibes. She just felt bad for them.

She hadn’t realized just how much the four relaxed around her and Ben and even Doug, a little, until she happened to glance over at Carlos once in Chemistry when the teacher was chewing out Sleepy’s son Sam (for sleeping in class, of course) and saw that his face was white as a sheet, freckles standing out in stark relief against his skin. Other than that, his fear wasn’t obvious, but his hands were clenched around the edge of the table, and his body was completely still, like a rabbit that had been caught in a car’s headlights. His intelligent eyes were watching the teacher intently, like he was waiting for a sign that he needed to flee.

Audrey smacked herself mentally a moment later when she realized that that’s _exactly_ what the boy was doing. By this point, the whole school was aware that their parents weren’t exactly loving, model examples of parenting, but she hadn’t even thought about or _considered_ how the other adults of the Isle acted.

After that, she watched all of them when they were around adults, and she realized that what she had taken for rebellion previously was actually just a carefully constructed veneer that hid how much adults truly made the Isle kids nervous. Evie flinched when Ms. Coy, the English teacher, raised her voice, and although Mal liked to provoke Mrs. Goode in Geometry, Audrey noticed that she never, ever took it far enough that she could be punished for it. Audrey wondered what they expected the teachers to do in terms of punishment, because they certainly couldn’t strike a student, but perhaps the Isle kids didn’t know that. Even Jay’s hands clenched in fists and his body went loose in preparation for a fight when Mr. Foxworth glared another student into silence when they interrupted in class.

In contrast to when they were on guard around adults, they were not nearly so much around other students. At first Audrey thought this was a little strange, because surely there were others who were also teenagers on the Isle who were terrible, and _were_ a threat? But then she thought about it further, and realized that although they were _less_ wary around other students, they were by no means relaxed. She couldn’t even be sure how much they really relaxed around her or around Ben.

After she realized this about the adults though, she made a point one day of complaining around the Four about detention being the worst thing teachers could come up with, and it was just _horrible_ , and although she knew it made her sound like a spoiled princess because she _knew_ that the others had been through _way_ worse, she thought that it might have made them feel a bit better to have this new information. She was equally sure though that they didn’t fully trust the information, because the wariness hardly faded at all.

Oh well, she decided. Only time could prove some things.


End file.
